Contents

The wilderness lies in the northern end of the Sacramento Mountains, east of the Piute Mountains and 18 miles (29 km) west of Needles, California, along Interstate 40 as its northern border. The wilderness covers approximately 14,645 acres (5,927 ha). Elevations range from 1,400 to 3,314 feet (427 to 1,010 m) at the top of the Sacramento range's Bannock Peak.[3]

In the wilderness area the vegetation types are predominantly of the creosote bush scrub plant community. The densest concentration of Bigelow cholla (Cylindropuntia bigelovii) in all California's deserts is found within the wilderness area and the surrounding terrain.

The western portion of Alta California was organized as the State of California, the California Gold Rush starting in 1848 led to dramatic social and demographic changes, with large-scale emigration from the east and abroad with an accompanying economic boom. If it were a country, California would be the 6th largest economy in the world, fifty-eight percent of the states economy is centered on finance, real estate services and professional, scientific and technical business services. Although it accounts for only 1.5 percent of the states economy, the story of Calafia is recorded in a 1510 work The Adventures of Esplandián, written as a sequel to Amadis de Gaula by Spanish adventure writer Garci Rodríguez de Montalvo. The kingdom of Queen Calafia, according to Montalvo, was said to be a land inhabited by griffins and other strange beasts. This conventional wisdom that California was an island, with maps drawn to reflect this belief, shortened forms of the states name include CA, Cal. Calif. and US-CA.

Settled by successive waves of arrivals during the last 10,000 years, various estimates of the native population range from 100,000 to 300,000. The Indigenous peoples of California included more than 70 distinct groups of Native Americans, ranging from large, settled populations living on the coast to groups in the interior. California groups were diverse in their organization with bands, villages. Trade and military alliances fostered many social and economic relationships among the diverse groups, the first European effort to explore the coast as far north as the Russian River was a Spanish sailing expedition, led by Portuguese captain Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo, in 1542. Some 37 years English explorer Francis Drake explored and claimed a portion of the California coast in 1579. Spanish traders made unintended visits with the Manilagalleons on their trips from the Philippines beginning in 1565

The name was derived from the Needles, pointed mountain peaks where the holes in them. This point on the Colorado River was a site for such a bridge, lacking firm banks. Additionally, the bridge was not of the best quality, which led to criticism that it was a flimsy looking structure, the flooding and meandering of the Colorado River destroyed the bridge in 1884,1886 and 1888. Finally the railroad surrendered to nature and built a high cantilever bridge at a much narrower point with solid rock footings, ten miles downstream near modern Topock, completing it in May 1890. Originally a tent town for construction crews, the railroad company built a hotel, car sheds, shops. Within a month the town boasted a Chinese washhouse, a newsstand, a restaurant, a couple of general stores. The town became the largest port on the river above Yuma, the landmark building is on the National Register of Historic Places and is being restored. Needles was a stop on the historic U. S. Route 66 highway from the 1920s through the 1960s.

For immigrants from the MidwestDust Bowl in the 1930s it was the first town that marked their arrival in California, the city is lined with motels and other shops from that era. The Cartys Camp which appears briefly in The Grapes of Wrath as the Joad family enters California from Arizona is now a ghost tourist court, Needles is a tourism and recreation center, a tradition going back for decades

On January 28,1969 an oil rig belonging to Union Oil experienced a blow-out 6 miles off the coast of California, the resulting spill was, at the time, the largest oil spill to occur in United States territorial waters. Following the spill, tides carried the oil onto the beaches of the Anacapa, San Miguel, Santa Rosa and this spill had a large impact on native wildlife of the Channel Islands. Much of the seabird population was affected, with over an estimated 3,600 avians killed. Meanwhile, seals and other sea life died and washed ashore on both the islands and the mainland and this spill is the third largest oil spill in the United States, only surpassed by the Deepwater Horizon and the Exxon Valdez oil spills. It resulted in a 34,000 acres expansion of the Department of the Interior buffer zone in the channel, the islands within the park extend along the Southern California coast from Point Conception near Santa Barbara to San Pedro, a neighborhood of Los Angeles. Park headquarters and the Robert J.

Lagomarsino Visitor Center are located in the city of Ventura, only three mammals are endemic to the islands, one of which is the deer mouse which is known to carry the sin nombre hantavirus. The spotted skunk and Channel Islands fox are endemic, the island fence lizard is endemic to the Channel Islands. One hundred and forty-five of these species are unique to the islands, Marine life ranges from microscopic plankton to the endangered blue whale, the largest animal on earth. Archeological and cultural resources span a period of more than 10,000 years, the average annual visitation to the parks mainland visitor center was around 300,000 in the period from 2007 to 2016, with 364,807 visiting in 2016. The visitor center is located in the Ventura Harbor Village, the visitor center contains several exhibits that provide information regarding all five islands, native vegetation, marine life and cultural history. Also, visitors can enjoy a film, free of charge. The visitor center is open day, except Thanksgiving and Christmas, from 8, 30AM–5

The desert tortoises are two species of tortoise native to the Mojave and Sonoran Deserts of the southwestern United States and northwestern Mexico and the Sinaloan thornscrub of northwestern Mexico. G. agassizii is distributed in western Arizona, southeastern California, southern Nevada, the specific name agassizii is in honor of Swiss-American zoologistJean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz. G. morafkai occurs east of the Colorado River in Arizona, as well as in the states of Sonora and Sinaloa and this species may be a composite of two species. The desert tortoises live about 50 to 80 years, they slowly and generally have low reproductive rates. They spend most of their time in burrows, rock shelters and they are most active after seasonal rains and are inactive during most of the year. This inactivity helps reduce water loss during hot periods, whereas winter hibernation facilitates survival during freezing temperatures, Desert tortoises can tolerate water and energy imbalances on a daily basis, which increases their lifespans.

These tortoises may attain a length of 10 to 14 in, a male tortoise has a longer gular horn than a female, his plastron is concave compared to a female tortoise. Males have larger tails than females do and their shells are high-domed, and greenish-tan to dark brown in color. Desert tortoises can grow to 4–6 in in height and they can range in weight from.02 to 5 kg. The front limbs have sharp, claw-like scales and are flattened for digging, back legs are skinnier and very long. Desert tortoises can live in areas with ground temperatures exceeding 140 °F because of their ability to dig underground burrows, at least 95% of their lives are spent in burrows. There, they are protected from freezing winter weather while dormant. Within their burrows, these create a subterranean environment that can be beneficial to other reptiles, birds. Scientists have divided the desert tortoise into two types and Morafkas desert tortoises, with a third type in northern Sinaloan and southern Sonora. An isolated population of Agassizs desert tortoise occurs in the Black Mountains of northwestern Arizona and they live in a different type of habitat, from sandy flats to rocky foothills.

They have a strong proclivity in the Mojave Desert for alluvial fans and they range from near sea level to around 3,500 feet in elevation. Tortoises show very strong site fidelity, and have well-established home ranges where they know where their food and mineral resources are. Desert tortoises inhabit elevations from below sea level in Death Valley to 5,300 feet in Arizona

The United States Geological Survey is a scientific agency of the United States government. The scientists of the USGS study the landscape of the United States, its resources. The organization has four science disciplines, concerning biology, geology. The USGS is a research organization with no regulatory responsibility. The USGS is a bureau of the United States Department of the Interior, the USGS employs approximately 8,670 people and is headquartered in Reston, Virginia. The USGS has major offices near Lakewood, Colorado, at the Denver Federal Center, the current motto of the USGS, in use since August 1997, is science for a changing world. The agencys previous slogan, adopted on the occasion of its anniversary, was Earth Science in the Public Service. Prompted by a report from the National Academy of Sciences, the USGS was created, by a last-minute amendment and it was charged with the classification of the public lands, and examination of the geological structure, mineral resources, and products of the national domain.

This task was driven by the need to inventory the vast lands added to the United States by the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, the legislation provided that the Hayden and Wheeler surveys be discontinued as of June 30,1879. Clarence King, the first director of USGS, assembled the new organization from disparate regional survey agencies, after a short tenure, King was succeeded in the directors chair by John Wesley Powell. Administratively, it is divided into a Headquarters unit and six Regional Units, Other specific programs include, Earthquake Hazards Program monitors earthquake activity worldwide. The National Earthquake Information Center in Golden, Colorado on the campus of the Colorado School of Mines detects the location, the USGS runs or supports several regional monitoring networks in the United States under the umbrella of the Advanced National Seismic System. The USGS informs authorities, emergency responders, the media, and it maintains long-term archives of earthquake data for scientific and engineering research.

It conducts and supports research on long-term seismic hazards, USGS has released the UCERF California earthquake forecast. The USGS National Geomagnetism Program monitors the magnetic field at magnetic observatories and distributes magnetometer data in real time, the USGS operates the streamgaging network for the United States, with over 7400 streamgages. Real-time streamflow data are available online, since 1962, the Astrogeology Research Program has been involved in global and planetary exploration and mapping. USGS operates a number of related programs, notably the National Streamflow Information Program. USGS Water data is available from their National Water Information System database

Lava Beds National Monument is located in northeastern California, in Siskiyou and Modoc counties. The Monument lies on the flank of the Medicine Lake Volcano. The region in and around Lava Beds Monument lies at the junction of the Sierra-Klamath, the Monument was established as a United States National Monument on November 21,1925, and includes more than 46,000 acres. Lava Beds National Monument has numerous lava tube caves, with twenty-five having marked entrances and developed trails for public access, the monument offers trails through the high Great Basinxericshrubland desert landscape and the volcanic field. 1872–1873, this area was the site of the Modoc War, the area of Captain Jacks Stronghold was named in his honor. Volcanic eruptions on the Medicine Lakeshield volcano have created a rugged landscape punctuated by these many landforms of volcanism. Cinder cones are formed when magma is under great pressure and it is released in a fountain of lava, blown into the air from a central vent.

The lava cools as it falls, forming cinders that pile up around the vent, when the pressure has been relieved, the rest of the lava flows from the base of the cone. Cinder cones typically only erupt once, the cinder cones of Hippo Butte, Three Sisters, Juniper Butte, and Crescent Butte are all older than the Mammoth and Modoc Crater flows, more than 30, 000–40,000 years old. Eagle Nest Butte and Bearpaw Butte are 114,000 years old, Schonchin Buttecinder cone and the andesitic flow from its base were formed around 62,000 years ago. The flow that formed Valentine Cave erupted 10,850 years ago, an eruption that formed The Castles is younger than the Mammoth Crater flows. Even younger were eruptions from Fleener Chimneys, such as the Devils Homestead flow,10,500 years ago, about 1,110 years ago, plus or minus 60 years, the Callahan flow was produced by an eruption from Cinder Butte. Though Cinder Butte is just outside the boundary of the monument, spatter cones are built out of thicker lava. The lava is thrown out of the vent and builds, layer by layer, Fleener Chimneys and Black Crater are examples of spatter cones.

Roughly ninety percent of the lava in the Lava Beds Monument is basaltic, there are primarily two kinds of basaltic lava flows, pahoehoe and aa. Pahoehoe is smooth, often ropy and is the most common type of lava in Lava Beds, aa is formed when pahoehoe cools and loses some of its gases. Aa is rough and jagged, an excellent example is the Devils Homestead lava flow, most of the rest of the lava in the monument is andesitic. Pumice, a type of lava, is found covering the monument

The last California grizzly was killed in this park in 1922, the California Black Oak is a key transition species between the chaparral and higher elevation conifer forest. At higher elevations in the front country, between 5,500 and 9,000 feet in elevation, the landscape becomes montane forest-dominated coniferous belt, found here are Ponderosa, Jeffrey and lodgepole pine trees, as well as abundant white and red fir. Found here too are the giant sequoia trees, the most massive living single-stem trees on earth, between the trees and summer snowmelts sometimes fan out to form lush, though delicate, meadows. In this region, visitors often see deer, Douglas squirrels, and American black bears. There are plans to reintroduce the bighorn sheep to this park, the vast majority of the park is roadless wilderness, no road crosses the Sierra Nevada within the parks boundaries. 84 percent of Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks is designated wilderness and is only by foot or by horseback. Sequoias backcountry offers a vast expanse of high-alpine wonders, covering the highest-elevation region of the High Sierra, the backcountry includes Mount Whitney on the eastern border of the park, accessible from the Giant Forest via the High Sierra Trail.

On the floor of canyon, at least two days hike from the nearest road, is the Kern Canyon hot spring, a popular resting point for weary backpackers. From the floor of Kern Canyon, the trail ascends again over 8,000 ft to the summit of Mount Whitney, in the summertime, Native Americans would travel over the high mountain passes to trade with tribes to the East. By the time the first European settlers arrived in the area, smallpox had spread to the region. The first European settler to homestead in the area was Hale Tharp, Tharp allowed his cattle to graze the meadow, but at the same time had a respect for the grandeur of the forest and led early battles against logging in the area

Yosemite National Park is a national park spanning portions of Tuolumne and Madera counties in Northern California. The park, which is managed by the National Park Service, on average, about 4 million people visit Yosemite each year, and most spend the majority of their time in the seven square miles of Yosemite Valley. The park set a record in 2016, surpassing 5 million visitors for the first time in its history. Almost 95% of the park is designated wilderness, Yosemite was central to the development of the national park idea. First, Galen Clark and others lobbied to protect Yosemite Valley from development, Yosemite is one of the largest and least fragmented habitat blocks in the Sierra Nevada, and the park supports a diversity of plants and animals. The park has a range from 2,127 to 13,114 feet and contains five major vegetation zones, chaparral/oak woodland, lower montane forest, upper montane forest, subalpine zone. Of Californias 7,000 plant species, about 50% occur in the Sierra Nevada, there is suitable habitat for more than 160 rare plants in the park, with rare local geologic formations and unique soils characterizing the restricted ranges many of these plants occupy.

The geology of the Yosemite area is characterized by granitic rocks, about 10 million years ago, the Sierra Nevada was uplifted and tilted to form its relatively gentle western slopes and the more dramatic eastern slopes. The uplift increased the steepness of stream and river beds, resulting in formation of deep, about one million years ago and ice accumulated, forming glaciers at the higher alpine meadows that moved down the river valleys. Ice thickness in Yosemite Valley may have reached 4,000 feet during the early glacial episode, the downslope movement of the ice masses cut and sculpted the U-shaped valley that attracts so many visitors to its scenic vistas today. The name Yosemite originally referred to the name of a tribe which was driven out of the area by the Mariposa Battalion. Before the area was called Ahwahnee by indigenous people, as revealed by archeological finds, the Yosemite Valley has been inhabited for nearly 3,000 years, though humans may have first visited the area as long as 8,000 to 10,000 years ago.

The indigenous natives called themselves the Ahwahneechee, meaning dwellers in Ahwahnee and they are related to the Northern Paiute and Mono tribes. Many tribes visited the area to trade, including nearby Central Sierra Miwoks, a major trading route went over Mono Pass and through Bloody Canyon to Mono Lake, just to the east of the Yosemite area. Vegetation and game in the region were similar to that present today, acorns were a staple to their diet, as well as seeds and plants, salmon. In 1851 as part of the Mariposa Wars intended to suppress Native American resistance and he was pursuing forces of around 200 Ahwahneechee led by Chief Tenaya. Accounts from this battalion were the first well-documented reports of ethnic Europeans entering Yosemite Valley, attached to Savages unit was Dr. Lafayette Bunnell, the company physician, who wrote about his awestruck impressions of the valley in The Discovery of the Yosemite. Bunnell is credited with naming Yosemite Valley, based on his interviews with Chief Tenaya, Bunnell wrote that Chief Tenaya was the founder of the Pai-Ute Colony of Ah-wah-nee

Interstate 40 is a major east-west Interstate Highway running through the south-central portion of the United States generally north of Interstate 10 and Interstate 20 but south of Interstate 70. The western end is at Interstate 15 in Barstow, its end is at a concurrency of U. S. Route 117 and North Carolina Highway 132 in Wilmington. It is the third longest interstate in the United States, behind Interstate 80 and Interstate 90. Much of the part of I-40, from Oklahoma City to Barstow, parallels or overlays the historic U. S. Route 66, east of Oklahoma City the route generally parallels U. S. Route 64. Interstate 40 is a major east–west route of the Interstate Highway System and its western end is in Barstow, California. Known as the Needles Freeway, it heads east from Barstow across the Mojave Desert in San Bernardino County to Needles, I-40 covers 155 miles in California. A sign in California showing the distance to Wilmington, North Carolina has been several times. Interstate 40 is a route to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon, with the exits leading into Grand Canyon National Park in Williams.

I-40 covers 359 miles in Arizona, just west of exit 190, west of Flagstaff, is its highest elevation along I-40 in the US, as the road crosses just over 7,320 feet. I-40 passes through the Navajo Nation, the largest Indian reservation in the US, I-40 covers 374 miles in New Mexico. Notable cities along I-40 include Albuquerque, Santa Rosa, Grants, I-40 travels through several different Indian reservations in the western half of the state. It reaches its highest point of 7,275 feet at the Continental Divide in western New Mexico between Gallup and Grants. Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas are the three states where I-40 has a speed limit of 75 mph instead of 70 mph which happens in California, Arkansas, Tennessee. In the west Texas panhandle area, there are several ranch roads connected directly to the interstate, one of the marked at-grade crossings is shown to the right. The only major city in Texas that is served by I-40 is Amarillo. I-40 has only one center in the state that Is located in Amarillo at the exit for Rick Husband Amarillo International Airport.

I-40 covers 331 miles in Oklahoma, Interstate 40 enters the west-central part of the state and runs for 284 miles in Arkansas. The route passes through Van Buren, where it intersects the southbound Interstate 540/US71 to Fort Smith, the route continues east to Alma to intersect Interstate 49 north to Fayetteville, Arkansas

Inside, exhibits tell the story of San Francisco’s colorful and diverse maritime heritage, the visitor center contains a theater and a ranger-staffed information desk. The building was built by the WPA as a public bathhouse. The architects were William Mooser Jr. and William Mooser III, the third-floor gallery is used for visiting exhibitions and in 2005 exhibited Sparks, an exhibition of shipboard radio and radioteletype technology. The Maritime Museum has re-opened after a series of renovations, the Maritime Research Center is the premier resource for San Francisco and Pacific Coast maritime history. Originating in 1939, the collections have become the largest maritime collection on the West Coast, one of these is the San Francisco Maritime National Park Association. The Visitors Center, Hyde Street Pier and Maritime Museum are all situated adjacent to the foot of Hyde Street, the park headquarters and Maritime Research Center are located in Fort Mason, some 10 minutes walk to the west of the other sites.

Opening times and fees for the sites can be found on the parks website. Aquatic Park is a place for open water swimming, both for recreation and training. The South End Rowing Club and Dolphin Club are located in Aquatic Park, WPA murals and sculpture at Aquatic Park — The New Deal Art Registry

Lizards are a widespread group of squamate reptiles, with over 6,000 species, ranging across all continents except Antarctica, as well as most oceanic island chains. The group is paraphyletic as it excludes the snakes which are squamates, Lizards typically have four legs feet and external ears, though some are legless, while snakes lack both of these characteristics. Lizards and snakes share a movable quadrate bone, distinguishing them from the sphenodonts, Lizards form about 60% of all the species of extant non-avian reptiles. Some extinctvaranids reached great size, The giant monitor Megalania is estimated to have reached up to 7 m long, including color vision, is particularly well developed in most lizards. Most lizards communicate using body language, using specific postures and movements to define territory, resolve disputes, some species of lizards use pheromones or bright colors, such as the iridescent patches on the belly of Sceloporus. These colors are visible to predators, so are often hidden on the underside or between scales and only revealed when necessary.

The particular innovation in this respect is the dewlap, a colored patch of skin on the throat. When a display is needed, a lizard can erect the hyoid bone of its throat, anoles are particularly famous for this display, with each species having specific colors, including patterns only visible under ultraviolet light, as many lizards can see UV light. Lizard tails are often a different and dramatically more vivid color than the rest of the body so as to potential predators to strike for the tail first. Many lizards, including geckos and skinks, are capable of shedding part of their tails through a process called autotomy. This is an example of the pars pro toto principle, sacrificing a part for the whole, the detached tail writhes and wiggles, creating a deceptive sense of continued struggle, distracting the predators attention from the fleeing prey animal. The lizard partially regenerates its tail over a period of weeks, a 2014 research identified 326 genes involved in the regeneration of lizard tails.

The new section contains cartilage rather than bone, and the skin may be discolored compared to the rest of the body, most lizards are oviparous, though in some species the eggs are retained until the live young emerge. Parthenogenesis occurs in at least 50 species and may be more widespread in the group. Sexual selection in lizards shows evidence of mate choice, favouring males display fitness indicators. However, doubt has been raised over the age of Tikiguania because it is almost indistinguishable from modern agamid lizards, the Tikiguania remains may instead be late Tertiary or Quaternary in age, having been washed into much older Triassic sediments. Lizards are most closely related to the Rhynchocephalia, which appeared in the Late Triassic, mitochondrial phylogenetics suggest that the first lizards evolved in the late Permian. It had been thought on the basis of data that iguanid lizards diverged from other squamates very early on

Muir Woods National Monument is a unit of the National Park Service on Mount Tamalpais near the Pacific coast, in southwestern Marin County, California. It is part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, and is 12 miles north of San Francisco and it protects 554 acres, of which 240 acres are old growth coast redwood forests, one of a few such stands remaining in the San Francisco Bay Area. The Muir Woods National Monument is an old-growth coastal redwood forest, due to its proximity to the Pacific Ocean, the forest is regularly shrouded in a coastal marine layer fog, contributing to a wet environment that encourages vigorous plant growth. The fog is vital for the growth of the redwoods as they use moisture from the fog during droughty seasons, the monument is cool and moist year round with average daytime temperatures between 40 and 70 degrees Fahrenheit. Rainfall is heavy during the winter and summers are almost completely dry with the exception of fog drip caused by the fog passing through the trees.

Annual precipitation in the ranges from 39.4 inches in the lower valley to 47.2 inches higher up in the mountain slopes. The redwoods grow on brown humus-rich loam which may be gravelly and this soil has been assigned to the Centissima series, which is always found on sloping ground. It is well drained, moderately deep, and slightly to moderately acidic and it has developed from a mélange in the Franciscan Formation. More open areas of the park have shallow gravelly loam of the Barnabe series, one hundred and fifty million years ago ancestors of redwood and sequoia trees grew throughout the United States. Today, the Sequoia sempervirens can be only in a narrow, cool coastal belt from Monterey, California. Before the logging industry came to California, there were an estimated 2 million acres of old growth forest containing redwoods growing in a strip along the coast. By the early 20th century, most of these forests had been cut down, just north of the San Francisco Bay, one valley named Redwood Canyon remained uncut, mainly due to its relative inaccessibility.

He and his wife, Elizabeth Thacher Kent, purchased 611 acres of land from the Tamalpais Land and Water Company for $45,000 with the goal of protecting the redwoods and the mountain above them. In 1907, a company in nearby Sausalito planned to dam Redwood Creek. When Kent objected to the plan, the company threatened to use eminent domain. Kent sidestepped the water companys plot by donating 295 acres of the redwood forest to the federal government, on January 9,1908, President Theodore Roosevelt declared the land a National Monument, the first to be created from land donated by a private individual. President Roosevelt agreed, writing back, MY DEAR MR, responding to some photographs of Muir Woods that Mr. Kent had sent him, Those are awfully good photos. Kent and Muir had become friends over shared views of wilderness preservation, in December 1928, the Kent Memorial was erected at the Kent Tree in Fern Canyon

The International Union for Conservation of Nature is an international organization working in the field of nature conservation and sustainable use of natural resources. It is involved in data gathering and …

Julian Huxley, the first Director General of UNESCO, took the initiative to set up IUCN

The Mojave Desert is an arid rain-shadow desert and the driest desert in North America. It is in the southwestern United States, primarily within southeastern California and southern Nevada, and it occupies 47,877 sq mi. Very small areas also extend into Utah and …

San Bernardino County, officially the County of San Bernardino, is a county located in the southern portion of the U.S. state of California, and is located within the Greater Los Angeles area. As of the 2010 U.S. Census, the population was 2,035,210, making it the fifth-most populous county in …

Needles is a city in San Bernardino County, California, United States. It lies on the western banks of the Colorado River in the Mohave Valley subregion of the Mojave Desert, near the borders of Arizona and Nevada and roughly 110 miles from the Las Vegas Strip. It is …

The Bureau of Land Management is an agency within the United States Department of the Interior that administers more than 247.3 million acres of public lands in the United States which constitutes one-eighth of the landmass of the country. President Harry S. Truman created the …

Horses crossing a plain near the Simpson Park Wilderness Study Area in central Nevada, managed by the Battle Mountain BLM Field Office

Snow-covered cliffs of Snake River Canyon, Idaho, managed by the Boise District of the BLM

Lightning-sparked wildfires are frequent occurrences on BLM land in Nevada.

Interstate 40 is a major east-west Interstate Highway running through the south-central portion of the United States generally north of I-10 and I-20 but south of I-70. The western end is at I-15 in Barstow, California; its eastern end is at a concurrency of U.S. Route 117 and North …

A sign showing the distance to Wilmington, North Carolina at the start of Interstate 40 in Barstow. This sign has been stolen several times.

Cylindropuntia bigelovii, the teddy bear cholla, is a cholla cactus species native to Northwestern Mexico, and to the United States in California, Arizona, and Nevada. — Description — Cylindropuntia bigelovii has a soft appearance due to its solid mass of very formidable spines that …

The coyote, Canis latrans, is a canine native to North America. It is smaller than its close relative, the gray wolf, and slightly smaller than the closely related eastern wolf and red wolf. It fills much of the same ecological niche as the golden jackal does in …

The black-tailed jackrabbit, also known as the American desert hare, is a common hare of the western United States and Mexico, where it is found at elevations from sea level up to 10,000 ft. Reaching a length around 2 ft, and a weight from 3 to 6 lb (1.4 to …

The ground squirrels are members of the squirrel family of rodents which generally live on or in the ground, rather than trees. The term is most often used for the medium-sized ground squirrels, as the larger ones are more commonly known as marmots or prairie dogs, while …

The roadrunners, also known as chaparral birds or chaparral cocks, are two species of fast-running ground cuckoos with long tails and crests. They are found in the southwestern United States and Mexico, usually in the desert. Some have been clocked at 20 miles per hour …

Rattlesnakes are a group of venomous snakes of the genera Crotalus and Sistrurus of the subfamily Crotalinae. The scientific name Crotalus is derived from the Greek κρόταλον, meaning "castanet". The name Sistrurus is the Latinized form of the Greek word for "tail rattler" …

Lizards are a widespread group of squamate reptiles, with over 6,000 species, ranging across all continents except Antarctica, as well as most oceanic island chains. The group is paraphyletic as it excludes the snakes and Amphisbaenia; some lizards are more closely related to these two excluded …

The desert tortoises, also known as desert turtles, are two species of tortoise native to the Mojave and Sonoran Deserts of the southwestern United States and northwestern Mexico and the Sinaloan thornscrub of northwestern Mexico. G. agassizii is …

California is a state in the Pacific Region of the United States. With 39.6 million residents, California is the most populous U.S. state and the third-largest by area. The state capital is Sacramento. The Greater Los Angeles Area and the San Francisco Bay Area are the nation's second and fifth …

The National Park Service is an agency of the United States federal government that manages all national parks, many national monuments, and other conservation and historical properties with various title designations. It was created on August 25, 1916, by Congress through the National Park …

In 1934, a series of ten postage stamps were issued to commemorate the reorganization and expansion of the National Park Service.

Depicts twelve figures, most in NPS uniforms, shown in occupations from left to right: a lifeguard, a Civil War reenactor, fire management, mounted patrol, researcher and/or natural resources with fish, a female ranger with two visitors, a laborer, a climber/rescuer, and a youth with a male ranger.

Death Valley National Park is an American national park that straddles the California—Nevada border, east of the Sierra Nevada. The park boundaries include Death Valley, the northern section of Panamint Valley, the southern section of Eureka Valley, and most of Saline Valley. The park occupies an …

Joshua Tree National Park is an American national park in southeastern California, east of Los Angeles, near San Bernardino and Palm Springs. The park is named for the Joshua trees native to the Mojave Desert. Originally declared a national monument in 1936, Joshua Tree was …

Aerial view of the desert wilderness area in the northeast corner of Joshua Tree National Park, and the transition zone between Mojave Desert and Colorado Desert. The upper part of the image is Mojave Desert north of the park.

Kings Canyon National Park is an American national park in the southern Sierra Nevada, in Fresno and Tulare Counties, California. Originally established in 1890 as General Grant National Park, the park was greatly expanded and renamed to Kings Canyon National Park on March 4, 1940. The park's …

View of Kings Canyon, looking south from Paradise Valley

Dusy Basin includes many small lakes, such as this one, carved by glaciers from granite.

Lassen Volcanic National Park is an American national park in northeastern California. The dominant feature of the park is Lassen Peak, the largest plug dome volcano in the world and the southernmost volcano in the Cascade Range. Lassen Volcanic National Park started as two separate national …

Pinnacles National Park is an American national park protecting a mountainous area located east of the Salinas Valley in Central California, about five miles east of Soledad and 80 miles southeast of San Jose. The park's namesakes are the eroded leftovers of the western half of an …

The Redwood National and State Parks are a complex of several state and national parks located in the United States, along the coast of northern California. Comprising Redwood National Park and California's Del Norte Coast, Jedediah Smith, and Prairie Creek Redwoods State …

Sequoia National Park is an American national park in the southern Sierra Nevada east of Visalia, California. The park was established on September 25, 1890 to protect 404,064 acres of forested mountainous terrain. Encompassing a vertical relief of nearly 13,000 …

Yosemite National Park is an American national park located in the western Sierra Nevada of Central California, bounded on the southeast by Sierra National Forest and on the northwest by Stanislaus National Forest. The park is managed by the National Park Service and covers an area …

Cabrillo National Monument is at the southern tip of the Point Loma Peninsula in San Diego, California, United States. It commemorates the landing of Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo at San Diego Bay on September 28, 1542. This event marked the first time a European expedition had set foot on what later …

Devils Postpile National Monument is a National Monument located near Mammoth Mountain in eastern California. The monument protects Devils Postpile, an unusual rock formation of columnar basalt. It encompasses 798 acres and includes two main tourist attractions: the Devils Postpile …

Basalt columns of Devils Postpile

Rainbow Falls at Devils Postpile National Monument

The tops of the postpile columns are accessible to visitors. The shapes of the columns are seen clearly here.

Lava Beds National Monument is located in northeastern California, in Siskiyou and Modoc counties. The monument lies on the northeastern flank of Medicine Lake Volcano and has the largest total area covered by a volcano in the Cascade Range. — The region in and around Lava Beds National Monument lies …

Muir Woods National Monument is a United States National Monument managed by the National Park Service. It is located on Mount Tamalpais near the Pacific coast, in southwestern Marin County, California. It is part of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, and is 12 miles north of San …

Point Reyes National Seashore is a 71,028-acre park preserve located on the Point Reyes Peninsula in Marin County, California. As a national seashore, it is maintained by the US National Park Service as an important nature preserve. Some existing agricultural uses are allowed to …

Headlands of the Point Reyes Peninsula from Chimney Rock, looking north.

Point Reyes National Seashore

Point Reyes National Shoreline 2018

A group of people gathered to watch the sunset at Point Reyes National Seashore.

Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front National Historical Park is a United States national historical park located in Richmond, California, near San Francisco. The park preserves and interprets the legacy of the United States home front during World War II, including the Kaiser Richmond …

Eastine Cowner, former waitress, works on a ship under construction

The Rosie Memorial in October 2007

A welder looks up from her work at Richmond shipyard, 1943

Midnight-shift shipyard worker Arlene Corbin (right) brings her daughter to a day care facility before going home to sleep

The San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park is located in San Francisco, California, United States. The park includes a fleet of historic vessels, a visitor center, a maritime museum, and a library/research facility. The park used to be referred to as the San Francisco Maritime Museum …

Fort Point is a masonry seacoast fortification located on the southern side of the Golden Gate at the entrance to San Francisco Bay. It is also the geographic name of the promontory upon which the fort and the southern approach of the Golden Gate Bridge were constructed.The fort was completed just …

Manzanar is most widely known as the site of one of ten American concentration camps where over 110,000 Japanese Americans were incarcerated during World War II from December 1942 to 1945. Located at the foot of the Sierra Nevada in California's Owens Valley between the towns of Lone Pine to the …

A hot windstorm brings dust from the surrounding desert July 3, 1942.

"Wooden sign at entrance to the Manzanar War Relocation Center with a car at the gatehouse in the background.", c. 1943

The United States Geological Survey is a scientific agency of the United States government. The scientists of the USGS study the landscape of the United States, its natural resources, and the natural hazards that threaten it. The organization has four major …

Channel Islands National Park is an American national park that consists of five of the eight Channel Islands off the coast of the U.S. state of California, in the Pacific Ocean. Although the islands are close to the shore of densely populated Southern California, their isolation has left them …